Noelle Richards shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Good morning Noelle , it’s such a great way to kick off the day – I think our readers will love hearing your stories, experiences and about how you think about life and work. Let’s jump right in? Have any recent moments made you laugh or feel proud?
Have you ever felt like you were an imposter in your career field that you’ve been in for the last 7 years? I have. These last few months I suffered from imposter syndrome with my career in esthetics and I couldn’t understand why. To help me, I decided to enroll in a 6-week mentorship program. In my enrollment I found that I wasn’t feeling like an imposter with esthetics but with something else, creating content.
Creating content was one of those activities I never felt comfortable with because I never felt confident in MY content. I would record content to post on my business page and whenever I went to edit my videos I never felt like they were good enough to post. I would compare what I had to others I saw and was easily discouraged. “Comparison is the thief of joy” ~ Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt. Well, my mentor forced me to change my perspective when it came to it. Over the last 3 weeks my mentor has tasked me with uploading content in my stories every 24 hours and post / reels every 48 hours at the most. In addition, she would have to approve of our posts or reels prior to uploading. That by far had been the hardest part of mentorship for me. It seemed like no matter what I sent to her it was never good enough. It was honestly discouraging to the point that I found myself crying and questioning my reasons for enrolling. I was ready to “crash out”. Although I had all those feelings, I understood her reasoning which has helped me become a better content creator and be more respectful of the process.
To help me through the creative process I decided that everything will be a moment to create content in relation to my business. I purchased a tripod and have been using it to record my services at different angles and even my own self-care days. I have been editing those videos and posting them to my stories daily while still navigating on how to create a post that would be approved by her.
Finally, after consistently hearing “No, this is boring, or I can find this on another esthetician’s page” I finally heard “I like this, and you did an amazing job. For me that was a proud moment seeing my hard work and dedication pay off in a matter of 3 weeks. If you asked me last year about my thoughts on creating content my answer would be completely different.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
Hello everyone, my name is Noelle, owner of Noelle’s Healing Table. I am your Atlanta based self-care practitioner providing you with healing experiences through corrective and relaxing skin care, hair removal with a hint of venting sessions, body work, and juice therapies.
Noelle’s Healing Table gave me a better understanding of how life has a funny way of shaping us into who we are at different moments in time long before we fully realize it. I say this because 2025 showed me that my business formed long before I envisioned it. My experiences from wanting to be the Pope in 3rd grade, to being forced to massage my teachers’ shoulders in 5th grade, giving my friends facials and pedicures in college, and my mom exposing me to juicing and colon hydrotherapy growing up were all a part of my path. I am currently working on obtaining my colon hydrotherapy certification. In understanding those aspects, I have further learned to understand myself. I have grown. I have healed. I have created an extension of myself to share with others who seek some form of healing.
This is why Noelle’s Healing Table is unique. I have taken pieces of my life experiences to create a space where clients are guided to the healing that they are seeking. I can provide clients with the ability to feel safe and secure. The ability to be vulnerable, to release, or to simply be. Everything that my journey towards healing has allowed me to do has created a space for my clients to do the same.
Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. What did you believe about yourself as a child that you no longer believe?
As I child I used believe that something was wrong with me. I felt like I was different from everyone else in more ways than one. People around me even used to call me weird and at the time it did hurt my feelings. I was a child, what child’s feelings wouldn’t be hurt by that? Now that I am an adult that has been actively healing, I can honestly say they were partially right I was / am weird. Not in the way they tried to label me but in a different way. The word “weird” has several definitions associated with it. It can be used to describe something as strange or unusual. It can imply a deviation from the norm or expected behavior. Being weird can evoke feelings of discomfort or curiosity. It can also refer to mystical elements in some contexts.
I identify with all those definitions because I embody all those aspects. I have never been one to conform with the societal standard of normal. I evoke feelings of curiosity and at the same time discomfort in those who are not their true authentic selves. I am a mystical being who can transmute another person’s negative feelings to a lighter and more positive tone. I have been able to help people forget what made them mad before they came to me. As an adult my own parents call me strange or weird and I’m okay with that because I know that I am.
Now that I am older and wiser I can confidently say that I am not the negative connotation people tried to place on me to hurt me.
What fear has held you back the most in your life?
Feeling like I was unable to fully connect with others or being supported by those closest to me. After I started being more intentional about my healing last year, I realized that being labeled weird did have negative effect on my self-esteem for a long time. It caused me to allow fear and doubt within myself to creep in which eventually affected the growth of my business. Those constant replays of that childhood trauma made me believe I couldn’t connect with others in the way I would need to be able to attract clients. I remember having conversations expressing business ideas to further help me grow and I would always speak negatively on the idea before I gave it chance. I would say “I don’t know how I will be able to connect with other people to attract new clients”. I am fortunate to have met someone named Marisha who spoke life into me and told me I will be great at whatever I do. Her encouragement has helped me to continue moving forward with my ideas of expansion.
In hindsight, it’s interesting how I allowed that fear to hold me back. I have always received praise for the type of person I am and being able to help others find their inner calm. This summer has been transformational in terms of growth. We are in the year of the snake, meaning we are shedding old layers of ourselves that no longer serve us. Just like a snake would shed its skin. Now that I am in this next phase of Noelle’s Healing Table I am glad that fear is no longer a hinderance to my growth.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. Is the public version of you the real you?
Yes, the public version of me is the real me. No matter what the setting I am the same. I can even go as far to say my long-time clients know the real version of me. Especially since they have seen me through various stages of my life and business.
The real version of me is the same version that has been given to you during our interview. I have a calm and warm demeanor that seems mysterious and draws people in. Almost like a moth is drawn to flame, if you will. I believe in living in my truth. That has been one of the easiest parts of my life because I never gave myself much room for error. Being bullied as a child for how I was or what I looked like made me always analyze everything that I did and spoke. I carried that part with me for a long time that it became integrated into the very core of who I am. What stemmed from negativity transformed into positivity. It has made living in my truth and being transparent one of my best attributes. It allows me to share my journey with others, so they know they are not alone on their own journey. On top of everything else I am probably one of goofiest and silliest people you may ever meet. The Noelle you meet in person or see on social media is exactly who I am when I am by myself or around those closest to me. What I have heard the most from those who I have encountered in life is to always stay true to the core of who I am. It’s nice to hear that because it has let me know that I have been on the right path.
Thank you so much for all of your openness so far. Maybe we can close with a future oriented question. What are you doing today that won’t pay off for 7–10 years?
If I could say anything it would be working at the towing company. I have been working here since 2021 and the company has been bought by two different companies, lost contracts and employees, and I have been working the same rotating 12-hour shift since I started. My job specifically has no room for job advancement and if it does, which it did, I will and have been passed up for the opportunity. Not because I’m not a hard-working and dedicated employee, but because no one wants to work from 7pm to 7am Tuesday and Wednesday nights or 7am to 7pm on Saturday and Sunday.
My reviews with customers and management have always been great. I always knew that I wasn’t going to be with this company that for an extended period of time. It was never in my plans. Once I realized that I truly wasn’t being valued I started requesting my time off and pouring back into what will pay off in the next 7 to 10 years, myself and my business(es).
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/experience_healing_at
